Konstantin Grigor’evich Mityaev: materials to the biography

Abstract

The article deals with the biography of Konstantin Grigor’evich Mityaev, professor, founder of the school of Russian documentary studies. All the scientific and pedagogical activities of K.G. Mityaev took place within the walls of the Moscow State Institute for History and Archives (MGIAI), all the graduates of MGIAI know the results of that activity, his main works, but to date, very little is known about his personal life. The documents we have identified in the GARF funds, which contain biographical information, allow us to get to know K.G. Mityaev’s creative path better: the conditions that led him to the walls of the Institute for History and Archives, the features of upbringing and education that drove Konstantin Grigor’evich to a successful professional activity in the archival sphere.

K.G. Mityaev was born in a small village in the family of an estate assistant manager. He was the youngest in the family, left without a mother early, but obviously received a good primary education. At the age of 18, he came to Moscow and entered the State Institute of Living Word, then decided to enroll in the Higher Cooperative Institute (VKI) established under the Plekhanov Institute of National Economy. It was his economic education and significant work experience in the accounting and economic environment that determined the emergence of his interest in studying primary sources in the field of economic processes and that lead him to the post-graduate school at MGIAI, with which the last thirty years of his life were associated. The features of Konstantin Grigor’evich Mityaev’s life path allow us to understand more deeply how he managed to collect, preserve, multiply and transfer the accumulated knowledge in the field of archival and documentary studies.